No glitter, no fuss, just a new-fangled view on life…

Monthly Archives: September 2015

There is no such practical thing as ‘finding’ a soulmate. (I’ve probably lost half of you straight away)

It comes from Greek myth.

“According to Greek mythology, humans were originally created with four arms, four legs and a head with two faces. Fearing their power, Zeus split them into two separate parts, condemning them to spend their lives in search of their other halves.”

From the people who brought you the woman who turns men to stone with one look, and the man with a bull’s head… Funny how we don’t hold those stories quite so dear as a lifestyle choice...

Soulmates do exist, yes, but finding one? Practical thinking now, people. Measure it up against the other myths.

No, folks, narcissists don’t turn into flowers; ferrymen do get paid, and let’s not even talk about Oedipus! And yet folks are happy to believe there’s that one perfect person who will magically appear.

One?! Just one?! I don’t know about you, but I don’t fancy those odds! And if you never find them? Well, that makes you responsible for ruining the life of someone out there…

And what if you find the wrong person? You’re depriving someone of their soulmate, thereby ruining the lives of three people.

You make the person you choose your soulmate. And they in turn make you theirs.

Okay, so let’s buy into this for a moment… say that –

YOU’VE FOUND HIM/HER – WHAT NEXT?

Prince Charming farts, Belle has to sort out Beast’s ingrown chin hairs, and Rapunzel’s prince picks his teeth at the dinner table.

The fairy tale is there, but sometimes the world gets in the way. Take as simple a thing as your prince waking you up in the morning…

The Hollywood:

He kissed her gently on her forehead. She stretched languorously, sighing as she slowly awakened. Peeling back the covers, she slipped gracefully from the bed and, with her hair slightly tousled and her make-up still intact, she smiled gorgeously at him as she slinked off to the bathroom.

The reality:

He kissed her gently on her forehead. She stretched awkwardly through the tangle of bedclothes, letting rip a terrifying fart and a satisfied groan as something clicked in her back. Ignoring the look of gassed-out horror on his face, she tumbled gracelessly from the bed, releasing such odours as would make her beloved’s face crease in disbelief as she lumped her way to the bathroom, tripping over last night’s bed socks as she went.

While describing the stories of fairytale heroines, a wise man once said: “Sandwiched between their ‘once upon a time’ and ‘happily ever after‘, they all had to experience great adversity.”

The fairy tale can continue – particularly if you look at it from an eternal perspective – you just have to accept that while you are living in this world, worldly things will sneak in and kill the moment. A lot. It would be wonderful, for example, to spend forever staring into each other’s eyes, but you must eat, or your human body will die. To eat, you must cook.

To cook, you must have food.

To have food, you must shop.

To shop, you must have money.

To have money, you must work.

To work, you must rest.

To rest, you must have a safe place, a home.

To have a home, you must –

You get the idea. And don’t even get me started on the washing up (no, literally – don’t!)!

And, of course, the going to the bathroom. I’ve never seen a fairy tale princess sat on the bog – have you? So unromantic and yet so unavoidable.

Life cannot be 100% fairy tale – you’d be dead within a month – see above. But neither can life be 100% the human necessities. So…

If you can just accept that these icky human details must and will be attended to, you will be able to enjoy the fairy tale moments much more.

So, dance on the beach in the moonlight, kiss under the stars… Just remember – that toilet won’t clean itself.

Aaand I’m back! Happy autumn, everyone! I’ve been away, in hiding/hibernation/cold storage. I have to do this every year, just in case we have a decent summer here in Britain. It’s yet to happen, but I would hate to get caught out!

So, here I am, with more raves, rants, and seriously random health tips…

And I’m not the only one that’s back. The students have started reappearing in their case-dragging masses. Which means one thing: very, very late loud nights. Now, this really shouldn’t bother me, what with my being a nocturnal animal and all that. Sadly, just like humans, I still have bills, and those bills say that I have to be a diurnal animal (luckily, I love my job!). This means that (like a lot of humans) I have to sleep during the night.

This is made extremely difficult because I’m constantly being distracted by my animal loving side hearing what sounds like a hundred cats being strangled outside. Of course, it isn’t a hundred cats being strangled at all: it’s just a hundred drunken teenagers let off the leash for possibly the first time in their lives.

But you really know when the students are back when you’re in a supermarket and it takes six people to buy one chocolate bar. And then the following conversation ensues at the till:

A: I’ve only got 47p I need 79p. B, can you lend me the rest? I’ll pay you back later.

B: I’ve only got 20p on me but I still owe you £1.50 from last night so if I give you the 20p would that do for now?

C: I tell you what, B owes me £1.70 for that bottle of water, so if I give you the money, she can owe me.

A: Great, thank you!

C: Oh, but I only have a 50 pence coin on me at the moment… I know, if-

Just buy the wretched chocolate!!!

Then, to add to the externally imposed sleep deprivation, there’s the meteorologically based skin problems…

And then there’s the real villain: cold sores. Now, I know most people get these during winter, but for me, when I get them, they’re triggered by sunlight. But here’s a little secret that the pharmaceutical companies don’t want you to know about: Lysine.

Here comes the science bit…

Our DNA is made up of strands of four chemicals (called base pairs) holding hands: Adenine with Thymine, and Cytosine with Guanine. The only time they let go is when your body’s cells split to make new cells. Viruses like cold sores have their own twisty-windy thing called RNA, which is basically a cheap knock-off, using the pairs Adenine/Uracil and Guanine/Cytosine. Viruses con your body into replicating them instead of your own cells. So when your DNA unzips itself, ready to get all jiggy and replicatey, the viral string of RNA slips up in there and tricks your cells into making another one of it, rather than another body cell. Rather like when you go to make a cuppa and your lazy toad friend says “Hey, make me one while you’re there!”

So, in steps Lysine. It interrupts the process, acting in much the same way as a vet in the same room as a male dog and a big pair of scissors. Take this and it will stop them in their tracks. Until of course, you catch the next one!

Okay, so I’ve probably just lost any readers who are biologists with my simplifying and Everyday-ifying this. Oh well.